Pickwick Report from Guide Steve Hacker, Yes the “Big” Stripers are Active 4-24-09
gengberg April 25th, 2009
Just a quick note, as many of you have been asking to be advised once the big stripers are tearing it up. They are!Fished with Tim Hosier and Jeff Carpenter the past two days. I’ll have to wait for Tim to e-mail pictures to include them in a future report, as I left my camera box in the Tahoe Thursday, and then got a memory error message when we tried to take pictures on Friday. But I got some good shots with Tim’s camera, and just have to wait until he can forward them to me. We were doubling and even tripling on fish from 20-30 pounds, and there were LOTS of breakoffs of giants. Jeff said it looked like a WW2 bombing raid was going on in the water, as huge fish were blowing up all around us, chasing hand-sized shad.
If you’re coming for a trip in the next 3 or 4 weeks, that bite should be consistent just about every morning, unless we get some big, flooding rains. 6″ swim baits, 1/2 oz. FishHead Spins, the big Red Fin, and a full size Spook, Chug Bug, or Pencil Popper is all you’ll need to bring for them.
Smallmouths pretty much locked on the beds the last half of this week. On Tim and Jeff’s trip we boated smallies to 5 pounds, and Tim lost a 6 pound class fish right at the boat. Those of you who have been with me when the fish are bedding know that we rely on the 4 inch worms, which were by far the best bait this week. The five pounder Thursday came on a 5 inch swimbait, and Jeff did catch a nice one on a spinnerbait. Some fish showing evidence of being done with the spawn, so the aggressiveness should really pick up in the next week to 10 days. Thanks!
God bless,
Steve
The photos are coming!
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